Frack by Hitler? Kevin O’Leary says he would force fracking on “all Canadian provinces.”

“Shark Tank” star and Conservative Party of Canada leadership candidate Kevin O’Leary says he would force all Canadian provinces to allow fracking.

… It is banned or under review in a number of provinces but O’Leary told the Halifax Chronicle-Herald Monday that he would override provinces that are not “pro-jobs.”

“I want to see development of natural gas, period, and it’s going to happen. This is the domain of each premier but at the end of the day, if their policies are not pro-jobs then they’ll have to deal with me. That’s how I lead,” O’Leary told the Chronicle Herald during an interview.

“If I find any leadership, regardless of party, is not supporting economic growth for their people, I’ll be very punitive. There’s many tools I have as prime minister, and I will apply them.” [Bully much?]

O’Leary is a late entry into the Conservative leadership race. When he jumped in last week, he joined 13 other candidates. Often likened to President Donald Trump because the actor/business/politician shares a similar no-nonsense approach to policy issues and a populist appeal, O’Leary is already the front-runner in the party’s contest and a recent Ipsos poll suggests that he could beat Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberals if an election were held now.

“The fracking stuff, it’s over. The technologies have advanced so far now, so fast that the concerns people had about fracking, they don’t have to have anymore. It is a such a science now that is so profound in providing extraction on a safe basis,” he said. [Refer below for Reality Checks]

O’Leary would also emulate Trump by eliminating regulations that inhibit the economy and he promises “to reverse everything” in Trudeau’s fiscal planning, including the prime minister’s coming carbon tax that O’Leary calls a “cash grab.”

“As soon as I get to Ottawa the rules and regulations have to be competitive with other jurisdictions, so I have to lower corporate tax rates, I have to lower personal tax rates, I have to strip away regulations that are detrimental to the economy, I have to eliminate the carbon tax everywhere. I’m basically going to have to reverse everything Justin Trudeau did.”

But O’Leary is careful to suggest there are some differences between his policies and those of the new president, though O’Leary doesn’t so much draw a line as a hint at one.

In response to Trump’s temporary travel ban that affects seven different countries, O’Leary’s criticism is muted.

“I’m Lebanese-Irish born from immigrants to Canada. If there was a wall in Canada, I wouldn’t be here,” O’Leary said.

“We’re a very inclusive country, we have unique cultures, that’s going to remain in my mandate, that’s going to be exactly what I defend, that’s what Canada is all about.” [Emphasis added]

Kevin O’Leary says Nova Scotia needs to get on board with fracking: “The technologies have advanced so far now, so fast that the concerns people had about fracking, they don’t have to have anymore.”

[Frack Damage Reality Checks:

End Frack Damage Reality Check]

Conservative Party leadership frontrunner and television personality Kevin O’Leary said if he’s elected Prime Minister he won’t let any provincial government get in the way of economic development.

This would include forcing Nova Scotia to end its ban on fracking, which has been in place since fall of 2014.

“I want to see development of natural gas, period, and it’s going to happen. This is the domain of each premier but at the end of the day, if their policies are not pro-jobs then they’ll have to deal with me. That’s how I lead,” O’Leary told the Chronicle Herald during an interview.

“If I find any leadership, regardless of party, is not supporting economic growth for their people, I’ll be very punitive.There’s many tools I have as prime minister, and I will apply them.”

[Another Harper at the helm? Tory Politician Reality Check:

O’Leary said he sees plenty of opportunity in the Atlantic Provinces, but growth and job creation is being hindered by policies that have made things like natural gas exploration unnecessarily difficult.

“The fracking stuff, it’s over. The technologies have advanced so far now, so fast that the concerns people had about fracking, they don’t have to have anymore. It is a such a science now that is so profound in providing extraction on a safe basis.”

[Frack Science Reality Checks, a few of many:

2013 03 29: Maddow shows incredible photos from explosive Texas ‘fracking’ accident
“Oil and gas workers were ‘fracking’ in Hemphill County, Texas,” Maddow said. … An explosion launched the so-called “frac stack,” the pipe for drilling and flushing water and debris from the drilling site, into the air like a javelin. It came down on nearby truck, impaling the vehicle. … One worker suffered a concussion, but thankfully there were no other injuries. … Maddow called it a “spectacular and highly visible failure in the world’s most profitable industry.”

O’Leary said he recognizes provinces like Nova Scotia — with many key seasonal sectors like forestry and tourism — have unique needs and he would not cut social programs and employment insurance in a way that would hurt families. But he said he would eventually like to see the high need for those programs in the region replaced by a strong economy, ideally with three-per-cent annual GDP growth.

“When I travel out east, everybody tells me they want to work. They want to be like everybody else, they want a job, they don’t want to be on the dole,” O’Leary said.

O’Leary, who officially announced his leadership campaign last week after more than a year of consideration, said if elected he would do away with any regulations hindering economic growth in Canada.

“When you have a land rich in resources and you do not use it for the benefit of the people, there’s something wrong with leadership,” he said.

“As soon as I get to Ottawa the rules and regulations have to be competitive with other jurisdictions, so I have to lower corporate tax rates, I have to lower personal tax rates, I have to strip away regulations that are detrimental to the economy, I have to eliminate the carbon tax everywhere. I’m basically going to have to reverse everything Justin Trudeau did.”

O’Leary said he believes carbon taxing is an unnecessary “cash grab” by governments that hurts both industry and consumers.

“We have 1.2 billion acres of forest land, we absorb four times more carbon than we emit,” he said. “We are so lucky that we have this environment that does an incredible job of absorbing so much carbon we do not need to tax ourselves this way.”

Instead, he said he favours a plan that would set emissions standards and leave it to industry to innovate and focus on developing an aggressive campaign to sell Canadian green technology to large polluting nations.

“We are so advanced in some of the things we do around energy — carbon capture, carbon sequestration, we’re the kings, why aren’t we selling this to people?” he said.

Often called “Canada’s Trump,” O’Leary said while he acknowledges his similarities with the newly-inaugurated U.S. president in that both are conservative businessmen and TV personalities, many of their policies don’t have much in common at all.

One area where their opinions diverge significantly is immigration.

“I’m Lebanese-Irish born from immigrants to Canada. If there was a wall in Canada, I wouldn’t be here,” O’Leary said.

“We’re a very inclusive country, we have unique cultures, that’s going to remain in my mandate, that’s going to be exactly what I defend, that’s what Canada is all about.”

Immigration is crucial to economic growth, O’Leary said, and if elected he would launch a “pro-growth” economic policy that would encourage partnerships with Canadian universities and businesses.

In preparing for what will be his first visit to the East Coast since launching his leadership campaign, O’Leary said he has been studying the fishery file, and said he doesn’t agree with scrapping the Last In, First Out shrimp policy which has been in place since 1997. The Liberal government agreed to get rid of the policy this spring after an external Ministerial Advisory Panel recommend an overhaul of the fishery in a review.

“If you’re an entrepreneur and you’re first in and you buy a boat and then the allocations start to change, you’ve gotta respect the guy that put up the money first, and I’ve seen that’s changing, that just doesn’t feel right to me.”

At the same time, O’Leary said he doesn’t support the monopolization of fish stocks, as has happened with the Arctic Surf Clam fishery, and said he’d like to see some of that quota opened up to competition.

O’Leary will be joining all but one of the 14 leadership candidates in Halifax this weekend for a debate hosted by the Nova Scotia Progressive Conservative Party Saturday at the Westin Nova Scotian [Emphasis added]